Even more over here!

Published: 02:39PM Dec 15th, 2011By:

Dear Classic American,...I have really enjoyed the Steve Miles pictures and his entertaining and well-informed text.

I bought his book as soon as it came out and e-mailed him at the time to ask if he had any pics of my car. It’s a right-hand drive Chevrolet 210 four-door hard top – registered new here in 1956 as SXN 909, only a few hundred numbers away from the Pontiac Chieftain on p89.

As for RHD, I am surprised by the open hostility it provokes in some people. For me a RHD yank is the best of all worlds – steering wheel on the proper side, Yank style and cheap prices because some people sneer at ’em. I also have a ’67 and ’67 AMC Rebel Convertible – also RHD and sold new here.
John Eckersley
Shepshed, Leics

It seems that Steve Miles’ Over Here section has proven extremely popular with readers, so we passed all your comments on to him, including John’s. Steve said in response: “That RHD 210 has got to be a real rarity – ‘56 was the first year of the four-door hardtop body, and most of the few they did sell would have been Bel Airs.

To have a 210, and in RHD, could well be almost unique. My own reluctance to run a RHD ‘yank-tank’ derives from my time in the parts business – I know only too well how difficult some things were to obtain for them even in the Seventies and Eighties.

Typically awkward parts were steering components, of course, and things like the oddball exhaust manifolds used on FE block Fords from ‘59-’64 that used to crack with monotonous regularity and were unobtainable even then.

And if I’m honest I've got so used to LHD that it feels strange to be on the other side now!”